This week we faced the very real possibility that Wellington Railway Station would get swept away as the Restoring Your Railways programme was cancelled in the Chancellor's statement on Tuesday.
This would have posed a serious threat to the Greenway as one of the key motivators for public funding is the need to connect communities to the station by means other than driving there.
Our first phase build was dependent on taking over the haul road that Network Rail will build on the north side of the ine, and which would normally be removed. However, they are pleased to leave it on place, saving them the cost of removal and allowing us to upfade it to an acceptble standard.
So, big kudos to our newly elected MP, Gideon Amos, for persevering right to the very end of the debate on Tuesday to get an assurance from the Chancellor that projects which had already started would not be cancelled. It remains to be seen whether stage 4 GRIP funding (there are 8 stages, and stage 6 is construction - read more here) is considered to be 'started', but all the signs are pointing to that being so.
Project Work Book Funding
One of the vital pieces of work we have to get going is a rigorous review of both route options and engineering solutions along those routes. This takes the form of a detailed project work book prepared by our partner organisation Greenways and Cycleroutes. For those of you who regularly read these posts, you will have seen mention of the legendary John Grimshaw. he heads up Greenways and Cycleroutes, but prior to that he founded sustrans and was at its head for 30 years. John is a Civil engineer who is currently building the Strawberry Line and many other projects around the country.
Funding for this type of work is not easy to find, but Somerset Council was awarded £400,000 by Active travel England to finance the the 'scoping' work for schemes that have not yet started. We applied for a very small portion of this fund but were turned down 'because it was not an on-road project'.
When you consider that a path that goes through the countryside costs about 1/6th of building on or adjacent to the highway, it does bring into question why Somerset Council would persist on a path alongside the A38 which they acknowledge will never get built.
We appreciate theyre are many competing priorotoes around the county, but when a community led organisation os offering to build (we're not asking the council to build it) a multi-user path between the County town and its nearest large satellite, you would think this one would be a very attractive proposition. But no, it's not. Maybe we need you to make your voices heard.
Street Stall
Finally, we have a street stall planned for this Saturday (3rd August 2024) in Taunton Town Centre. Come along and say hello - we'll be very pleased to see you!
Comments